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Parental Time, Role Strain, and Children's Fat Intake and Obesity-Related Outcomes

  • by Alex McIntosh, Rodolfo M. Nayga, Jr., Jenna Anding, Cruz Torres, Karen Kubena, Ernesto Perusquia, Genevieve Yeley and Wen You
  • 6/14/2006
  • CCR-19

Overview

This study uses a unique dataset to examine parental influence on children’s dietary intake and whether or not the children will become obese. The study shows that household income, parents’ time spent with children, and par-ents’ work experiences significantly affect children’s energy and fat intake and obesity-related outcomes. For exam-ple, the more time mothers spent with their children, the lower the children’s Body Mass Index (BMI) was. On the other hand, the more time fathers spent with their children, the higher the children’s BMI was. And the more time both fathers and mothers spent with their children, the higher their children’s fat intake (as a percentage of energy) was. In general, mothers tended to have a greater effect on their children’s dietary intake than fathers did. Both par-ents seemed to influence children ages 9-11 more than they did children ages 13-15.

This study was conducted by the Texas A&M University under a cooperative research contract with USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS) Food and Nutrition Assistance Research Program (FANRP) (ERS project representative: Constance Newman). The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of ERS or USDA.

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